Many heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems include both air-conditioning units as well as one or more environmental devices other than the air-conditioning unit. For example, an HVAC system might include an indoor air-conditioning unit for cooling or heating an area within a building, a humidifier for humidifying the area, and an electric heater for providing auxiliary heat to the area when needed.
Conventionally, the air-conditioning unit and the other devices are controlled separately. For example, in the above HVAC system, there would be an air-conditioner controller for controlling the indoor air-conditioner and an auxiliary controller for controlling the humidifier and the electric heater. Anytime it is necessary to operate the HVAC system as a whole, a user must separately operate both the air-conditioning controller and the auxiliary controller. The two are entirely different systems requiring entirely different control mechanisms.
As a result of this, it is difficult for the user to operate the entire HVAC system efficiently and effectively.
It would be desirable, therefore, for there to be a single controller that controlled both core air-conditioning units as well as auxiliary environmental devices, such as humidifiers or electric heaters in an HVAC system.